DVDCompress

📖 Overview

DVDCompress is an open-source, self-hosted web application that transforms arbitrary digital video files (.mp4, .mkv, .avi, .mov, .ts, .webm, etc.) into 100% standard-compliant, standalone-playable DVD-Video (VIDEO_TS) and Blu-ray (BDMV) physical optical discs or master ISO images.

Equipped with a real-time mathematical bitrate budget calculator, ultra-fast zero-copy GPU HDR10 / Dolby Vision tone-mapping (300+ FPS), interactive DVD menu authoring, multi-audio and subtitle preservation, automated DVD-9 seamless layer break calculation, direct optical drive burning, and a modern responsive web interface, DVDCompress eliminates the complexity of optical authoring on home servers, Unraid, TrueNAS, and NAS systems.

✨ Features

🔊 Multi-Audio Track Selection & Smart Audio Rules

• Interactive Audio Selection: Individually select, deselect, and preview audio streams per title with channel layout, format, language tags, and bitrate indicators.
• Smart Audio Priority Defaults: Configurable smart audio rules (persisted in /config/settings.json):
  • Language priority list matching (e.g. en, eng, ja, jpn).
  • Preference for multi-channel surround sound (5.1 / 7.1) over stereo downmixes.
  • Maximum audio tracks per title constraint.
  • Keep all tracks vs Keep only default/first track modes.
• Standard-Compliant Audio Multiplexing: Authors up to 8 AC3 audio streams on DVD-Video (dvdauthor.xml) and full multi-audio tracks on Blu-ray (tsMuxeR), complete with language codes and seamless remote control audio track switching.
• Multi-Track Bitrate Budgeting: Bitrate calculator automatically accounts for multi-audio allocations to guarantee the disc never overflows.

⚡ Ultra-Fast GPU HDR10 & Dolby Vision Tone-Mapping (300+ FPS)

• Zero-Copy Hardware Pipeline: Leverages jellyfin-ffmpeg with native tonemap_cuda and scale_cuda hardware filters on NVIDIA GPUs.
• Hable Filmic Color Adaptation: Converts BT.2020 PQ/HLG HDR10 and Dolby Vision to Rec.601 (DVD) or Rec.709 (Blu-ray) SDR without washed-out colors or blown-out dynamic range.
• 2-Phase GPU Intermediate Architecture: Streams high-speed tone-mapped intermediates with instant cleanup after encoding.

📺 Interactive DVD Title Menus & Auto-Play Navigation

• Interactive Title Menus: Automatically generates DVD-Video root menus with dynamic button highlights rendered via spumux subpicture overlays.
• Navigation Modes: Choose between Interactive Menu (with "Play All" and individual episode buttons) or Auto-Play Directly (starts immediately on disc insert).
• Flexible End Actions: Return to the title menu upon playback completion or auto-play the next episode in sequence.
• Remote Button Jumping: Supports the DVD remote "Menu" button during playback via VTSM root menu bridges.
• Master Palette Color Mapping: Merges menu button highlight palettes with subtitle subpictures into a unified 16-color table to eliminate dvdauthor color map full errors.

💬 Subtitle Preservation (PGS Bitmap & SRT Text)

• Blu-ray PGS Bitmap Conversion: High-fidelity conversion of PGS bitmap subtitles to DVD subpictures (dvdsub) with 4-color quantization and PTS timestamp alignment.
• SRT Text Subtitle Rendering: Automatically renders text subtitles into DVD subpictures using FreeType font styling.
• Multi-Track Remote Selection: Multiplexes up to 32 subtitle streams into DVD-Video and Blu-ray discs with language tags and remote control subtitle toggle support.

📐 Dynamic Aspect Ratio Preservation

• No Squished or Stretched Video: Automatically calculates native Source Aspect Ratio (SAR/DAR) and applies precision letterboxing or pillarboxing (pad filter).
• 16:9 Anamorphic Widescreen & 4:3 Fullscreen: Fully compliant NTSC (720×480 @ 29.97fps) and PAL (720×576 @ 25fps) framing.

⏭️ Full-Movie Chapters & Markers

• Marker Extraction: Extracts existing embedded chapter markers from MKV/MP4 files or automatically generates 5-minute interval chapters across the full duration of each title.

🔍 1-Minute Video & ISO Sample Preview Generator

• Instant Test Previews: Generate a 1-minute .mp4 video sample or a playable mini ISO image in seconds to verify video quality, audio synchronization, aspect ratio, and subtitle rendering before committing to a full multi-hour burn.

🚀 Blu-ray Direct Stream Passthrough

• Lossless Stream Copying: When source video and audio already adhere to Blu-ray / BDMV standards (H.264 High@L4.1 / HEVC UHD and AC3/DTS), DVDCompress bypasses transcoding completely for near-instant ISO mastering.

🎯 Automated DVD-9 Seamless Layer Break Calculation

• Deep Filesystem & IFO Parsing: Scans ISO9660 directory structures and DVD-Video IFO Cell Address Tables (VTS_C_ADT) to locate the optimal 16-sector ECC-aligned chapter/cell layer transition point ($L_0 \ge L_1$).
• Optical Laser Transition Injection: Passes -use-the-force-luke=break:<sector> to growisofs and streams live layer break transition telemetry to prevent playback stutter on standalone DVD players.

🔥 Direct Optical Disc Burning & Standalone ISO Burner

• Hardware Drive Discovery: Auto-detects SCSI/SATA/USB optical drives (/dev/sr*, /dev/sg*) with media status queries and tray inspection.
• Burn Speed Control & Underrun Protection: Integrated buffer underrun protection via growisofs and cdrskin/xorriso.
• Standalone ISO Burner Tab: Directly burn existing ISO images to optical media with custom write speeds (2x, 4x, 8x, MAX).

🧮 Dynamic Bitrate Budgeting Engine & Complexity Sampling

• Dynamic Bitrate Budgeting: Mathematically calculates optimal video and audio bitrates across $N$ inputs with precision filesystem overhead allocation (UDF/ISO 9660 + MPEG multiplexing factors):
  • DVD-5 (Single Layer): 4.30 GiB target budget (~4,300 MB)
  • DVD-9 (Dual Layer): 7.85 GiB target budget (~7,850 MB)
  • BD-25 (Single Layer Blu-ray): 23.00 GiB target budget (~23,000 MB)
  • BD-50 (Dual Layer Blu-ray): 46.00 GiB target budget (~46,000 MB)
  • BD-66 (Dual Layer UHD): 61.50 GiB target budget (~61,500 MB)
  • BD-100 (Triple Layer BDXL): 92.00 GiB target budget (~92,000 MB)
  • BD-128 (Quad Layer BDXL): 118.00 GiB target budget (~118,000 MB)
• Fast Sample Complexity Analysis: 3-point sample encoder estimating real-world VBR bitrates.
• Smart Disc Recommendations: Dynamic UI widget suggesting Single-Layer vs Dual-Layer media with a 1-click format switcher.

📋 Async Job Queue, Concurrency Slots, & Persistent History

• Parallel Concurrency Slots: Configurable concurrent worker slots (1 to 4 parallel jobs) with FIFO queue scheduling.
• Pause, Resume, & Cancel: Live job control using process signals (SIGSTOP/SIGCONT).
• Persistent State: Saves queue, application settings, and job history across container restarts (/config/settings.json, /config/jobs.json).
• Job History Management: Sortable history table with duration, output size, pagination, one-click Retry for failed jobs, and Edit to reload previous configurations.

🌐 Modern Real-Time Web Interface & Telemetry

• Zero-Bloat Frontend: Pure HTML5, ES6 JavaScript, and CSS3 dark-mode design system (no React or external CDNs required).
• Live Hardware Telemetry: WebSocket stream reporting real-time CPU %, RAM %, GPU %, VRAM usage, GPU temperature, encoding FPS, speed multiplier (e.g. 4.09x), and ETA.

🏗 Architecture

+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|                                    Docker Container                                   |
|                                                                                       |
|  +---------------------------+     +-----------------------------------------------+  |
|  |     Modern Web UI         | <-> |       FastAPI Application Server (Python)     |  |
|  |  (HTML5 / Vanilla ES6)    |     |  - REST Endpoints & WebSocket Broadcasting    |  |
|  |  - Real-Time Telemetry    |     |  - Concurrency Queue Scheduler (FIFO)         |  |
|  |  - Capacity & VBR Gauges  |     |  - Settings & Job History JSON Persistence    |  |
|  |  - Audio & Subtitle Setup |     +-----------------------------------------------+  |
|  +---------------------------+                             |                          |
|                                                            |                          |
|           +------------------------------------------------+                          |
|           |                                                                           |
|           v (Orchestrated Pipelines)                                                  |
|  +--------------------+  +--------------------+  +------------------+  +-----------+  |
|  | Transcoding        |  | Menu & Subtitles   |  | Disc Authoring   |  | Burning   |  |
|  | - Jellyfin FFmpeg  |  | - Menu Generator   |  | - dvdauthor      |  | - growiso |  |
|  | - NVDEC / NVENC    |  | - spumux Pipeline  |  | - tsMuxeR        |  | - cdrskin |  |
|  | - tonemap_cuda     |  | - PGS Quantizer    |  | - xorriso        |  | - xorriso |  |
|  | - CPU Fallback     |  | - SRT Subtitles    |  | - Layer Break    |  | - lsscsi  |  |
|  +--------------------+  +--------------------+  +------------------+  +-----------+  |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
       |                                   |                                |
       v (Volume Mounts)                   v (GPU Passthrough)              v (Device Pass)
   /media  (Source Videos)              --gpus all                      /dev/sr0, /dev/sg0
   /output (Authored ISOs)             (NVIDIA Driver Capabilities)      (Optical Writer)
   /config (App Settings & Queue)
   /tmp/dvdcompress (Working Scratch)

🚀 Quick Start

1. Docker Compose (Recommended)

Create a docker-compose.yml file:

services:
  dvdcompress:
    image: hovee/dvdcompress:latest
    container_name: dvdcompress
    restart: unless-stopped
    ports:
      - "8080:8080"
    environment:
      - TZ=America/New_York
      - DVDCOMPRESS_LOG_LEVEL=INFO
      - NVIDIA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=all
      - NVIDIA_DRIVER_CAPABILITIES=all,video,compute,utility
    volumes:
      # Source media directory (mount read-only for safety)
      - /path/to/your/media:/media:ro
      # Authored ISO files output directory
      - /path/to/your/output:/output:rw
      # Persistent app settings and job history
      - /path/to/your/config:/config:rw
      # Scratch directory for intermediate transcoding and authoring
      - /path/to/your/temp:/tmp/dvdcompress:rw
    devices:
      # Optical disc writer block device and SCSI generic pass-through
      - /dev/sr0:/dev/sr0
      - /dev/sg0:/dev/sg0
    deploy:
      resources:
        reservations:
          devices:
            - driver: nvidia
              count: all
              capabilities: [gpu, video, compute, utility]

Launch the container:

docker compose up -d

Open your browser and navigate to: http://<your-server-ip>:8080

2. Docker CLI

GPU-Accelerated Mode (NVIDIA)

docker run -d \
  --name dvdcompress \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  --gpus all \
  --device /dev/sr0:/dev/sr0 \
  --device /dev/sg0:/dev/sg0 \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -v /mnt/media:/media:ro \
  -v /mnt/dvd_output:/output:rw \
  -v /mnt/appdata/dvdcompress:/config:rw \
  -v /tmp/dvdcompress:/tmp/dvdcompress:rw \
  -e TZ=UTC \
  -e NVIDIA_VISIBLE_DEVICES=all \
  -e NVIDIA_DRIVER_CAPABILITIES=all,video,compute,utility \
  hovee/dvdcompress:latest

CPU-Only Mode

docker run -d \
  --name dvdcompress \
  --restart unless-stopped \
  --device /dev/sr0:/dev/sr0 \
  --device /dev/sg0:/dev/sg0 \
  -p 8080:8080 \
  -v /mnt/media:/media:ro \
  -v /mnt/dvd_output:/output:rw \
  -v /mnt/appdata/dvdcompress:/config:rw \
  -v /tmp/dvdcompress:/tmp/dvdcompress:rw \
  -e TZ=UTC \
  hovee/dvdcompress:latest

🖥 Deployment Guides

Unraid OS

1. Install the NVIDIA Driver plugin from Unraid Community Applications (if using an NVIDIA GPU).
2. Install the DVDCompress Docker container via Community Applications or load templates/DVDCompress.xml:
   • Repository: hovee/dvdcompress:latest
   • WebUI: http://[IP]:[PORT:8080]
   • Port: 8080 $\rightarrow$ 8080
   • Path 1 (Media): /mnt/user/Media $\rightarrow$ /media (Read-only)
   • Path 2 (Output): /mnt/user/Media/dvd_output $\rightarrow$ /output (Read/Write)
   • Path 3 (Config): /mnt/user/appdata/dvdcompress $\rightarrow$ /config (Read/Write)
   • Path 4 (Scratch Temp): /mnt/user/appdata/dvdcompress/working $\rightarrow$ /tmp/dvdcompress (Read/Write)
   • Device 1: /dev/sr0 $\rightarrow$ /dev/sr0
   • Device 2: /dev/sg0 $\rightarrow$ /dev/sg0
   • Extra Parameters: --gpus all --device /dev/sr0:/dev/sr0 --device /dev/sg0:/dev/sg0
   • Variables: NVIDIA_VISIBLE_DEVICES = all, NVIDIA_DRIVER_CAPABILITIES = all,video,compute,utility

TrueNAS SCALE

1. Navigate to Apps $\rightarrow$ Launch Docker Image (or Custom App).
2. Set Image: hovee/dvdcompress:latest.
3. Set Port Forwarding: Host Port 8080 $\rightarrow$ Container Port 8080.
4. Configure Host Path Storage Volumes for /media, /output, /config, and /tmp/dvdcompress.
5. Under GPU Resource Allocation, assign 1 NVIDIA GPU.
6. Under Device Passthrough, pass /dev/sr0 and /dev/sg0.

⚡ Hardware Acceleration

DVDCompress utilizes jellyfin-ffmpeg with CUDA, NVDEC, and NVENC hardware acceleration:

💿 Optical Drive Pass-Through

To enable physical disc burning from inside Docker, pass both the optical block device (/dev/sr*) and the SCSI generic device (/dev/sg*):

1. Identify optical drives on the host:

   lsscsi -k
   # Example output: [2:0:0:0] cd/dvd ASUS BW-16D1HT /dev/sr0 /dev/sg0
   

2. Verify device permissions:

   ls -l /dev/sr0 /dev/sg0
   

3. Pass devices in Docker Compose:

   devices:
     - /dev/sr0:/dev/sr0
     - /dev/sg0:/dev/sg0
   

Dual-Layer (DVD-9) Automated Layer Break & Burning

When burning DVD-9 dual-layer media (DVD+R DL / DVD-R DL), DVDCompress automatically:

1. Locates Chapter Boundaries: Scans the disc filesystem and IFO navigation tables to place the physical layer break at an exact Chapter/Cell start sector with closed GOP sequence headers.
2. Enforces Physical Constraints: Ensures Layer 0 holds $\ge 50%$ of data ($L_0 \ge L_1$) aligned to a 32 KB (16-sector) ECC block.
3. Programs Optical Hardware: Injects -use-the-force-luke=break:<sector> into growisofs.
4. Streams Live Transition Telemetry: Alerts the live log terminal the exact moment the drive laser refocuses onto Layer 1.

📊 Disc Target Capacities & Sector Budgeting

Safe Outer-Edge Margins: DVDCompress intentionally targets ~4,300 MB on DVD-5 and ~7,850 MB on DVD-9 to stay safely away from the outer 10% edge of recordable media where dye thinning causes laser tracking errors on older players.

📡 REST API & WebSocket Reference

DVDCompress exposes a comprehensive REST and WebSocket API:

System & Telemetry

File Browser & Media Analysis

Job Orchestration & Previews

🛠 Local Development & Testing

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/hoveeman/DVDCompress.git
cd DVDCompress

# Create virtual environment and install dependencies
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Run full automated test suite (209 tests)
pytest tests/ -v

# Run local development server with hot-reload
uvicorn dvdcompress.api:app --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8080 --reload

📄 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.